John Madden and George Seifert: Bay Area Natives and NFL Coaches with Amazing Career Winning Percentages





In NFL history, there have been over 500 head coaches. The one with the highest winning percentage is Elgie Tobin, who had a 16-3-4 record and a .783 winning percentage over his two seasons as coach of the Akron Pros (ties count as half a win). Tobin's short coaching career ended in 1921. The next year, Guy Chamberlain started his six-year NFL head coaching career. During the first five years of career, Chamberlain had an amazing record: he went 55-9-2 and had a .848 winning percentage. If he had stopped coaching after his fifth year, he would have had the highest winning percentage of any NFL head coach. His sixth year did not go well: he went 3-7-1 with the Chicago Cardinals and ended his career with a 58-16-7 record and a .759 winning percentage (less than that of Tobin).

While Chamberlain does not have the highest career winning percentage, he does have the highest winning percentage of any NFL head coach with at least 50 wins. The man with the second highest such winning percentage is the late John Madden. Madden, a Bay Area native, served as the head coach of the Oakland Raiders for ten seasons. Madden compiled a 103-32-7 record and a .750 winning percentage. During his first nine seasons, Madden made it to the AFC Championship Game seven (!!!) times and had a .774 winning percentage. In his final season, Madden went 9-7 as the Raiders missed the playoffs. If he had stopped coaching after his ninth year, he would have had the highest career winning percentage of any NFL coach with at least 50 wins.

Shortly after Madden retired from coaching, he was hired by CBS to work as an NFL broadcaster. Madden had a long and successful broadcasting career: he worked at CBS as a color commentator for fifteen years, at FOX for eight years, at ABC for four years, and at NBC for three years. His career as an NFL color commentator (30 years) was three times as long as his career as an NFL head coach (10 years)! It's no wonder more people remember him as a broadcaster than as a coach. I started following the NFL closely in 1994 so I witnessed the last half of his broadcasting career (his time with FOX, ABC, and NBC). Even though Madden was ridiculed by some, I enjoyed listening to Madden and was saddened by his passing two years ago.

While Madden does not have the highest career winning percentage of any NFL head coach with at least 50 wins, he does have the highest winning percentage of any NFL head coach with at least 100 games coached. The man with the eleventh highest such winning percentage is another Bay Area native: former San Francisco 49ers and Carolina Panthers coach George Seifert had a 114-62 record and a .648 winning percentage. Seifert had a remarkable start to his head coaching career. In his first eight seasons (all with the 49ers), he won two Super Bowls and had a .766 winning percentage (higher than that of the career winning percentage of Madden and Chamberlain) before resigning. Like Madden, Seifert was hired by CBS to be a broadcaster after coaching a Bay Area NFL team for several seasons. Unlike Madden, he was an unsuccessful broadcaster.

Later on, Seifert returned to coaching with the Carolina Panthers after signing a contract worth over ten million dollars. Seifert's stint with Panthers was a disaster as he went just 16-32 in his three seasons with the team and failed to make the playoffs each year. (Seifert is the only former Panthers coach not to make the playoffs with the team.) While Seifert certainly benefited financially by his decision to join the Panthers, there is no doubt that he harmed his legacy with his Panthers' tenure (even more so than Chamberlain and Madden did with their final seasons). This was Seifert's resume before he joined the Panthers: Madden (just one Super Bowl win as a head coach, no Super Bowl wins as an assistant, six 10-win seasons) was elected into the Pro Football Hall of Fame and Seifert would probably already be there with him if he ended his NFL head coaching career in the Bay Area like Madden did. Madden had to wait twenty-eight years after his coaching career ended before he was elected into the Hall of Fame and it appears that Seifert will have to wait at least that long to be elected. Seifert's last game came in 2001.

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